Excerpt of The Other Woman by Brenda Novak

ELIZABETH O'CONNELL WASN'T sure she could tolerate another

minute. This was her fifth blind date in as many weeks, and each of them had been significantly worse than the one before.

"I heard what happened with your ex-husband." Carter Hudson, the tall, dark-haired man seated across from her at the new Dundee Inn and Steakhouse reached over to touch her hand. "It must've been a terrible ordeal."

With light-brown eyes and strong, rugged features, Carter wasn't unhandsome. But the way his thumb rested against the pulse at her wrist gave the impression he didn't care so much about what she'd suffered as he did about pretending to commiserate with her — to make sure this night ended in as friendly a way as it could. Besides, his New York accent grated on her nerves. Almost everything about him grated on her nerves.

Looking for a distraction, she glanced around the dining room to see if she could spot someone she knew. She'd lived in Idaho for less than two years, but Dundee was a town of only fifteen hundred people, and she'd already become acquainted with many of the locals.

Unfortunately, it was a Thursday in late May, the height of the tourist season. She saw no one familiar. City slickers and yuppies drawn to the area by the RunningY Ranch, which offered visitors an authentic western vacation, filled the steak house.

Liz, while stubbornly keeping her smile in place, wished the waitress would arrive with their dinners and tried to focus. "It wasn't easy," she said. "But it's over now. Thank God."

Carter didn't take the hint. "And yet you're on friendly terms with him. Wasn't he on the phone a moment ago?"

Keith, her ex, was attempting to fix the wall at her new store. She knew she probably shouldn't allow him to do her any more favors. But she'd relied on him for so long that it was still easier to accept his help than refuse it. And he was the father of her children. If The Chocolaterie proved as successful as she hoped it would, they all stood to benefit. With Keith working at the hardware store, it wasn't as if he could provide her with much child support. "Yes."

"You spoke to him as if you are good friends," he marveled. It seemed that every man she dated either wanted to discuss his past relationships or hers. And once what had happened to her was out in the open, she faced a million questions.

She used the excuse of taking a drink of water to shift her hand. "I don't see any reason to be the stereotypical ex-wife."

Carter relaxed in his chair with easy grace. Judging from his build, he could move with impressive coordination and speed. But Liz doubted Carter ever really exerted himself. "That's pretty forgiving. I'm sure it doesn't sound very nice, but if I were you I'd make him pay — whether I was being stereotypical or not."

Her grip tightened on her glass. Her emotions were complicated when it came to Keith, and Carter's negativity wasn't helping. "Why, when we have so many friends and loved ones in common? Maybe it'd be different if we lived in a big city. But in a town like this, we have to deal with each other every day."

"You're serious? You can take what he did as though it was nothing?"

"We have two children together," she said, hoping he could understand the point of that, if nothing else.

Carter reacted with a snort of incredulity. "From what I've heard, he has three more with your brother's wife."

Liz told herself to count to ten. She itched to get up and walk out. Without an explanation. Without a backward glance. But she couldn't. She loved Senator Garth Holbrook and his wife, Celeste, who'd set up this dinner date. She didn't want her behavior to reflect poorly on them. Maybe if Carter was only a casual acquaintance of the senator's, she wouldn't have to be so careful. But he'd just opened a field office for Garth and still worked with him. "She wasn't my brother's wife at the time," she said.

"No, you were both married to Keith."

The waitress approached, carrying two plates, and Liz sat back in relief. But the arrival of their food didn't distract Carter. He simply dodged the waitress's movements and continued to talk. "How long did he lead this double life — wasn't it close to eight years?"

Liz couldn't imagine Senator Holbrook sharing such information with someone she didn't know. Not when his daughter Reenie had suffered because of Keith, too. "Who told you about it?"

"Everyone who gets the chance," he responded, adjusting the napkin on his lap.

"You're talking about Keith, aren't you?" the waitress said. Liz had met this woman at the salon when she was getting her hair cut, and had seen her around town several times since. Her name was Mandy something, and she always stopped Liz to marvel over what had happened as if they were good friends when, in reality, Liz barely knew her.

"What an incredible story," she went on before Liz or Carter could respond. "That he was able to maintain two separate families without giving himself away is amazing. I still can't believe he didn't go to jail for what he did."

"The state has too many violent criminals to spend money prosecuting someone like Keith. He didn't marry me to commit fraud, and he's always taken care of his children."

"Still. It's amazing."

"Yes, it is," Carter said dryly.

Liz ground her teeth. These people had no idea what she'd been through — or why. "Maybe if you knew Keith, you'd understand. He was gone half the time because of his job. I had no reason to suspect him of being unfaithful."

Carter drew forward in his seat. "Unfaithful? He had a whole other family."

"He wouldn't strike you as the type of person to do what he did."

"You were living with him," he pointed out. The waitress, who'd been struggling to light a candle on the table finally managed to succeed. "Yeah, but she and Reenie were two states apart. Otherwise, they probably would've found out sooner." She put her lighter back into the pocket of her burgundy apron and smiled engagingly at Carter. "By the way, I love your accent."

Liz had no patience left and ran over Carter's polite acknowledgment as she tried to make her point. "Keith has a strong sense of responsibility. That's partly what got him into trouble."

The waitress toyed with the salt and pepper shakers in a rather obvious attempt to stick around, but when Liz leveled her with a meaningful look she finally seemed to realize she had no business there.

"I'll check back in a few," she said, belatedly snapping into work mode.

"Thank you," Liz said and picked up her fork. Mandy hurried off and Carter cut into his steak. "If you ask me, lying and cheating is what got your ex-husband into trouble."

There had been a time when she wouldn't have attempted to justify Keith's behaviour. But now that she'd put some emotional distance between the revelation that had caused her divorce and herself, she could almost understand how her ex-husband's particular strengths and weaknesses had combined to turn a simple affair into an even bigger mistake. In any case, she felt more loyalty to Keith than she did this stranger. Had Keith not married her, Mica wouldn't have had the family she'd known for the first eight years of her life and Christopher never would have been born.

"How can I blame Keith for loving Reenie, when my own brother couldn't resist her?"

"Your brother married her almost as soon as she was divorced from Keith, right?"

She bit back a sigh. "Right."

"So you came first?" Carter asked. "He met the senator's daughter after?"

Liz cleared her throat, struggling with the shame that so often engulfed her. She hadn't come first. Keith had already been married to Reenie for three years when Liz met him on that plane. She hadn't been aware of this, of course. She and Reenie had lived in parallel universes, unknown to each other until Liz's brother had uncovered the truth eighteen months earlier. When Isaac spotted Keith at the airport, traveling to Idaho the very day he was supposed to be in Phoenix, her world had come crashing down around her.

"No. But I had no idea he was already married." She'd been pregnant with Mica and head-over-heels in love.

"It came as a complete shock." Carter continued to look dis-believing.

She nodded. "Wow." He wiped his mouth with his napkin. "You're remarkably forgiving to be on speaking terms with him."

Liz could feel Carter's disapproval, despite the fact that his remark appeared to be a compliment. "You've never been married, have you?"

He held his fork halfway to his mouth. "What makes you think so?"

His inflexibility had given him away. He still believed he could call all the shots in a relationship, live in a world of absolutes and straightforward decisions. If she had her guess, he'd never been deeply in love or deeply hurt. So he had the luxury of believing he didn't have to compromise.

"A good guess." She swallowed her bite of garlic mashed potato without tasting a thing. He'd learn someday, she told herself. She didn't have to worry about it. This man wasn't right for her. She wanted to steer the conversation back to neutral ground until they could part ways amicably.

Evidently, however, her tone had revealed more irritation or been more challenging than she'd intended, because his expression darkened and became guarded. "Senator Holbrook said you're from Brooklyn," she said, trying to fill the sudden silence.

"That's right. I grew up there."

"How are you surviving in such a small town? It's got to be a shock."

"It's different." He shrugged as if he accepted the shift in topic, but the wariness that had become so noticeable following Liz's comment about marriage clung to him like frost. "I'm not convinced it's all bad."

"You've only been here a few weeks."

"Are you telling me it's going to get worse?"

She couldn't help wishing his Dundee experience wouldn't be entirely positive. "You haven't been through a winter yet."

His lips, which she would have found beautifully sculpted had she been willing to admire them, quirked. "Do you mean to give the impression you're trying to get rid of me?"

"I'm just doubtful you'll like it here, that's all," she said, as if her feelings were really that simple.

He started to eat again, chewing slowly, his actions deliberate. "You're from Los Angeles. How do you like it?"

It had taken a significant adjustment. If not for the desire to see her children grow up with their father nearby, she would've returned to L.A. long ago. But now...

She surveyed the familiar dining room. She didn't want to tear Mica and Christopher away from Keith, and she couldn't imagine leaving her brother, Reenie or Reenie's three girls. She was also afraid of what she might do if she were to go back. Trouble waited for her there in the form of her former tennis coach.

Briefly, she wondered if her infatuation with Dave Shapiro, seven years her junior, was the cause of her less than enthusiastic response to the much more eligible men she was dating in Dundee. "It's becoming home."

"You don't think the same thing will happen for me?"

"I doubt it." She pushed at her potatoes with her fork, avoiding his gaze. "I'm guessing you're too ambitious for these parts, too interested in climbing the ladder of success. Which means you won't be staying long."

"You say that as if ambition is bad."

"Not necessarily. As long as you don't mind temporary relationships."

"Dundee's not a real hot spot," he agreed, washing down another bite of meat with a sip of wine. "But there's nothing wrong with temporary relationships. People pass in and out of other people's lives all the time. You never know what you might learn from someone, how a particular person can enrich your experience, even if they don't become a permanent fixture."

She chuckled softly. At least this guy made no apologies for who or what he was. She had to respect that. "Your words sound an awful lot like that country song, "Lot of Leavin' Left to Do."

He laughed out loud. Feeling triumphant at seeing through him so quickly, she was tempted to let her lips curve into a smile. But she suspected that his motivations weren't quite that simple. He just wanted her to think so.

She buttered a sourdough roll. "How'd you meet Senator Holbrook in the first place?"

"When I went to college —"

"Where'd you go?"

"Harvard."

Liz refused to let that impress her.

"Anyway, I thought I wanted to go into politics, so I interned for a state senator in Massachusetts. After I graduated, he hired me full-time and I ran his first campaign."

"But then?"

"But then I took a different career path. When I eventually decided to get back into politics, I contacted him. He didn't have an immediate opening, but he asked around and almost before I knew it, I was flying out here."

"I see. So you're looking for someone to help stave off the boredom while you're in Dundee? Is that it?"

"I'm interested in company," he said with a shrug. "I'm not sure about anything else."

"By anything else...you mean a relationship?"

He chewed thoughtfully before answering. At last, he said,

"Probably."

"Well..." She gave him a confident smile. "You don't have to put me on notice."

"I don't?"

"No."

A dimple flashed in his cheek, seeming rather out of place amid the hard planes of his face. "Interesting you think so."

"Why?"

"What I've heard so far wouldn't lead me to believe that." Her knife scraped against the surface of her plate. "Because my husband cheated on me?" she asked, forcing herself to stay calm.